A Durable Cease-Fire?

Some thoughts on the dynamics of the cease-fire:

Yet it’s not as if there’s nothing left to fight for. The United States and Israel have not achieved their core war objectives, including the destruction of the Iranian nuclear program, the destruction of Iran’s missile and drone industries, and the defeat of Iran’s militias.

The dual blockade continues to inflict damage on both Iran and the global economy. But these problems are chronic, not acute, and it is difficult to resolve chronic problems in a limited war.

Unfortunately, without a permanent peace agreement that addresses the core issues in some fashion, the uneasy balance of war and peace will continue. Maintaining the status quo in the long term is not tenable because the economic pain on both sides will only continue to increase.

Yesterday I was digging around the synonyms for “frail” and “brittle” with which to describe the cease-fire, and it occurred to me that this was wrong-headed; the cease-fire has proven to be pretty resilient, given that both sides have had plenty of excuses to go back to war if they wanted to. The words I settled on were “elastic” and “flexible.” The situation as I see it:

• Nobody but Israel wants to fight
• This disinterest in fighting is manifested in the willingness of both sides to ignore violations
• Nevertheless, the elasticity is not infinite; because of the pressure of the dual blockade we either have to fight again or come to a more complete accord, as the status quo is not tenable.

Some other links:

• An AH-64 Apache crashed in the Strait; crew was rescued by a drone boat.
• Audience costs are a thing.
• The long journey of a Patriot missile.
• Arab states aren’t high on expanding the Abraham Accords.